Jonathan Demme’s courtroom drama is worth watching for Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington, who make its plea for decency affecting. The script explains too much and gives gay life too little space.
Philadelphia is a good courtroom drama with an awkward habit of explaining feelings its actors have already made clear. Jonathan Demme wants to reach people who need persuading about AIDS and gay rights, and he chooses a form that makes each point easy to follow. That choice gives the film directness, but limits how much uncertainty, anger or ordinary untidiness can enter the story. At 126 minutes, it has ample time to move beyond the lesson, and does so less often than we would like.
The opening is less cautious. Tak Fujimoto’s images of Philadelphia street life and Craig McKay’s assembly of them establish a city full of people before the film settles into legal argument. We get a sense of lives continuing outside the case, which matters in a film so concerned with whose suffering receives attention. That breadth makes the more carefully managed drama that follows feel a little restricted.
Tom Hanks, as Andrew Beckett, provides the strongest reason to stay with it. His physical transformation could have become the whole performance; instead, his face remains worth watching for more than signs of illness. We were moved by Hanks in close-up because he makes Beckett’s suffering feel personal, even when the script is busy explaining its wider significance. Demme and Fujimoto put considerable trust in those close-ups. Hanks repays it without needing every point underlined.
Denzel Washington’s Joe Miller gives the film another person worth attending to, rather than merely another position in a debate. Washington makes the story’s changing attitudes convincing enough that we can follow the movement towards understanding without feeling that every step has been imposed by the writer. Ron Nyswaner’s screenplay is less trusting of us. Its explanations repeatedly arrive after the performances have done the necessary work, and some courtroom exchanges sound prepared for an audience being introduced to the subject.
Kristi Zea’s production design keeps the courtroom from competing with the speakers, a sensible choice when so much depends on watching people listen and respond. Howard Shore’s score is less restrained about prompting sympathy, and we sometimes wanted it to leave the faces alone. The film is already explicit about what hurts and why. Its care with the people on screen survives this pressure, though the more emphatic passages would benefit from less help.
The larger problem is how cautiously the gay relationship is treated. A drama asking for acceptance ought to allow gay life more room than this, and the reluctance to do so makes its appeal feel unnecessarily apologetic. The familiar courtroom framework makes the case easy to follow, but the relationship needs attention of a different kind. Demme and Nyswaner give it too little space for everyday affection, disagreement or pleasure.
Most critics are less persuaded than we are, chiefly because that caution compromises the film’s account of gay life. We share the objection, but think they give too little weight to the performances and Demme’s attention to faces. Those are substantial reasons to watch, even when the writing grows solemn and instructive. Choose it for Hanks and Washington, with some patience for the speeches.
